Little Miss Molly
by darnedchild
Summary: A short fic for Molly Hooper Appreciation Week Part Deux - Day One : I Knew I ... You Before I Met You (Fanworks focusing on reputations before they meet). Technically Molly isn't even in this thing as it's written completely from Jim Moriarty's POV, but you it's 'about' Molly so . . . Also it's sort of pre-Sherlolly if you squint. Spoiler from TFP.


**A/N: I'm not absolutely sure this fills today's theme, but it's what I got so I'm going with it. Unbeta'd because I'm going to live dangerously these next seven days (and also because I keep waiting until the last minute to write these things because I have poor time management skills). There is a reference to Molly Hooper's blog (which was an official BBC tie-in to the show and can be found at www dot mollyhooper dot co dot uk - the specific entry in question is for March 25th.**

 **Little Miss Molly**

 **Molly Hooper Appreciation Week Part Deux - Day One : I Knew I _ You Before I Met You (Fanworks focusing on reputations before they meet)**

Jim Moriarty abhorred surveillance work. Watching boring people go about their tediously dull lives, waiting for that one little moment that would make them useful (whether they recognized the significance or not). He had people, experts really, to do that sort of thing for him; people who could distill hours—sometimes days—worth of footage and sound into exactly the information he needed.

Yet there he was, reviewing a highlight reel of the life (if you could bother to label the man's rather pathetic existence a "life") of Sherlock Holmes over the last few months. Double and triple checking the data to make absolutely sure he'd found the weak spot he'd been searching for. The last piece of the puzzle that would allow him to begin The Game.

It was Eurus, dangerously brilliant Eurus Holmes, who had pointed the way. Her softly uttered "Redbeard" had been the key to the Holy Grail he had been searching for since Sherlock edged past mild nuisance with that Carl Powers business into full blown annoyance.

"Sentiment will be his downfall."

He'd almost dismissed her out of hand. Years of checking in on the Menace told him that Sherlock barely tolerated the common rabble, and they—almost as a whole—tended to like him even less. Sherlock used people to get what he wanted, but he had no real attachment to any one of them. If they denied him whatever he was after at the moment, he'd quickly move on to another rube.

Or so Jim had thought.

Upon closer inspection (with a nudge from Eurus), the cop was the first to stand out. Lestrade. Disgustingly upright. No gambling addiction, not even a drinking problem to exploit. He'd thought the cop only came around at the urging of Brother Mikey, trying to keep Sherlock sober by giving him another puzzle to play with; but Lestrade actually seemed to have a small fondness for Sherlock. And on several occasions, he has seen Sherlock make an effort, however tiny, to maintain that . . . whatever it was. Not a friendship, obviously.

Then there was Mike Stamford at Barts, another tool of Big Brother, sent to keep Sherlock occupied and out of the gutter. The man indulged Sherlock like an uncle humouring a precocious child.

Of course, Jim had been aware of Mousey Hooper from the moment her name began to appear on the files his men "borrowed" from NSY whenever Sherlock blundered into one of Jim's operations and caused problems. She was plain and quiet and remarkably easy to overlook.

Now, as he sat at the desk of "Jim from IT" once again rewatching the highlight reel of old CCTV footage liberated from Barts' security servers before the usual weekly purge; Jim acknowledged that he had made an error in judgement in his quick dismissal of Little Miss Molly.

The woman was obviously attracted to Sherlock's appearance—Which Jim conceded was rather striking, if circumstance had been different he might have been tempted to give the other man a go himself. The thought of Sherlock on his knees and begging was rather tempting; but he'd say something irritating and Jim would most likely have to kill him, and the game would be over too soon.— and she seemed to be one of the rare few who _liked_ Sherlock.

The man, even as much of an imbecile as he was, had to be aware of her feelings; yet he continued to come back to request her assistance again and again. There were other pathologists at Barts, some with more experience. The combined influence of Lestrade and Mycroft could have forced any of them to work with Sherlock if they were reluctant, but Sherlock repeatedly chose to encourage Molly's infatuation. The question was why.

The answer had been surprisingly simple, and oddly disappointing.

In January, John Watson had limped into Sherlock's world. It only took one viewing of their introduction for Jim to know that the former Army doctor would become a pressure point—perhaps the biggest one, surpassing even Mycroft or the Holmes parents. But two other things from that meeting struck him as odd.

Sherlock "forgetting" a riding crop in the morgue (which wasn't nearly as titillating as Jim had initially hoped), and his comment about Molly's lips. Sherlock didn't forget things, he deliberately chose to leave items in places they shouldn't have been. And what reason could he possibly have had to mention the woman's mouth?

Jim had demanded to see the morgue footage, both before and after John's entrance.

Molly Hooper had a bit of a kinky streak if the way her eyes lit up watching Sherlock weld that riding crop. She saw him beat the dead body of someone she'd known in life and _still_ asked him out. That was the sort of woman that Jim would have enjoyed getting his hands—and other parts—on, if only the circumstances were different. "Jim from IT" would never dare to suggest a bit of rough play. What a waste.

And there was Sherlock commenting on Molly's lipstick again (for the first time, really). More importantly, he had taken note of the shape and colour of Molly's mouth, had made a point to file that information away in his brain, had kept a visual reference in his memories for comparison.

The after footage was even more telling. Sherlock had strutted into the morgue as if he owned the place, and then deflated when he realized it was empty. The time stamp told a delightful story of how a supposedly indifferent man loitered next to the cadaver for nearly four and a half minutes before reluctantly picking up his "forgotten" riding crop. The split second of unmasked emotion that washed over his face when Molly pushed her way through the door never failed to make Jim smirk.

Sentiment.

The way Sherlock hesitated, as if he wanted to say something, before nodding his head and squaring his shoulders to confidently stride out of the room as if he hadn't been waiting to see her again had been enough to make Jim giggle the first time he'd seen it.

The Virgin had come delightfully close to reconsidering Molly Hooper's offer of "coffee".

Once he knew where to look, it was clear as day in every witnessed interaction. John Watson would be a breaking point, but Little Miss Molly (Oh, how he was beginning to like the sound that, perhaps he'd try to convince her it was meant to be an affectionate pet name.) would be Jim's way in.

He leaned forward and with a few taps on his laptop keyboard the archived footage switched to a live feed of Molly at her desk. Naughty girl, updating her silly little blog on company time.

Jim grinned as he brought the blog up in another tab.

 **Hi, sorry, are you the lady who works in the morgue? The one with the nose?**


End file.
